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Do you work in a quiet office with a noisy computer? Disconcerting, isn’t it? If you enjoy peace and quiet, there is a solution. And it might not cost you as much as you think! Silencing AA Or . . . The SILENCE OF THE FANS . . . By Ross Tester We’re not sure of the origin of this picture – it was sent to us via the ’net (so we apologise if we are breaking anyone’s copyright!). Some people do go to extraordinary lengths . . . 8  Silicon Chip siliconchip.com.au Noisy BEAST Beast NOISY T his all started a few months ago when he-who-writes-thecheques finally conceded that my poor old PC wasn’t really up to handling today’s software. So we purchased a new computer – at the time, the fastest and best-performing system we could find. Performance-wise, it was superb (once a couple of annoying bugs were ironed out). But it was noisy. Boy it was noisy: anyone walking into my office could instantly hear the noise of the computer above the sparkling repartee. widespread problem. From the many comments I found on the web and various newsgroups, it would appear that a lot of people are concerned about PC noise. And most put the blame squarely with the CPU manufacturers. They bust their buns to produce faster and faster CPUs (which of course run hotter and hotter), then go and let the side down with just-good-enough fastrevving fans which scream their heads Back to the supplier First thing I did was to return the computer to the supplier. Along with the request for the bug fix (it tended to lock up when transferring data via the USB port), I asked them to check out the noise. A couple of days later the machine was returned. They reckoned they’d fixed the lock-up problem but the noise was exactly the same. Not happy, Jan! I queried the noise and their service manager told me that the noise level was “absolutely normal” for a fast Pentium IV machine. Sceptical me didn’t really believe him but on investigating further, I found that noisy PCs really were a siliconchip.com.au off, relying on after-market suppliers to solve the problem for them. We’ve since heard many different stories about noisy fans. Every supplier, it seems, has a different version. Then the techs put a different slant on it. One that does keep popping up is that Intel had a bad (ie, noisy) batch of fans towards the end of last year. Is that true? No-one is admitting anything, of course. But here’s the rub: we asked one of the companies featured in this article to lend us a Pentium 4 CPU for photography. It was brand new and came with an Intel fan, nearly identical to mine. Just on a whim, we measured the sound output: a full 7dBA less, just sitting on the bench! That’s not far off sounding half as loud. Mmmm. Makes one wonder, what? Where to go from here? It’s just your average, fast, Pentium IV computer but it’s so noisy. Well, it was noisy before a few mods! And then along came CeBIT. As I mentioned in the brief show report in June SILICON CHIP , there were at least three stands at the show specialising in cooling and silencing PCs (actually the two problems go hand-in-hand). I talked to the people there and told them that SILICON CHIP was interested in doing a feature article on the subject. All wanted to co-operate with us. And this article is the outcome of those discussions. July 2004  9 I told the companies that we wanted to do two things with this article. First, we wanted to show readers how to go about quietening an existing noisy PC (and did I have the perfect “model”!). Second, we wanted to “start from scratch” – how to go about building the quietest PC we could manage. Note that I said “we could manage” – there is a dramatically quieter option available if you have deep pockets (see separate panel). But this approach would not be all that practical for the average person, so we’ve taken a more realistic, lower dollar approach. LowNoisePC The first person I talked to was Rodney Maslovsky of LowNoisePC (www. lownoisepc.com; (02) 9403 3305). Guess what he specialises in? Rodney discussed the various options possible for making my noisy PC quieter – a lot quieter. It is mainly with his advice, and gear, that I attacked my PC. And as you’ll see, “attacked” is quite literally true – with a power drill and nibbler to start with! The step-by-step approach using a lot of LowNoisePC gear follows shortly. Altech Computers I had already seen Altech Computers (www.altech.com.au; (02) 9735 5655) at CeBIT but it was actually Rodney Maslovsky who suggested I also talk to Altech (and they are a competitor of his!) about cases. His philosophy was that if you want a quiet PC, the place to start is the case. Most PC suppliers put together systems based on a variety of sources: a case from here, (usually including a power supply), motherboard from there, CPU, memory, etc from somewhere else, along with disk drives, etc etc. And due to the extremely competitive nature of the computer game, a dollar or so saved here and there can really make a difference. Incidentally, that’s one of the reasons it’s hard for the average person to build a PC these days that’s as cheap as a ready-built one. As well as their economies of scale (a few dollars here, a few cents there) they shop around to find the best deals on all the bits and pieces. Most “low cost” ready-built PCs come in cases which retail for as little as $45 or so. And that includes the power supply! I have to say, by and large cheap cases are noisy cases – their panels are notoriously thin and often illfitting, they vibrate, their standard of assembly is not that great (my noisy PC has just 12 rivets holding the whole thing together!). The power supply is noisy, too. Yet you can pay hundreds, even thousands of dollars for a good PC case. You must be getting something extra for your money – and you are. Build quality, thickness, rigidity, lack of resonances . . . as you go up in price, things generally do improve. Of course, there are exceptions. Rodney suggested that one of the best “reasonable price” cases around was the Antec Sonata. It’s actually marketed as a low-noise case. He’d put his money where his mouth was and built his own PC in one of them. And it was certainly very quiet! The Australian agents for Antec, by The Antec “Sonata” is designed as a very low noise case and is a great place to start if you’re building a new PC. Along with rigidity and several noise and vibration reducing features, it is supplied with a low-noise supply and lownoise case fan. Note the extra-large airflow holes on the rear panel (above). At left is the latch which opens the side panel to allow access to the “works”. 10  Silicon Chip siliconchip.com.au Two of the myriad of choices for a CPU cooler. Above is the giant Zalman Ultra Quiet CNPS700A-AlCu (the one we eventually used) while at right is the Spire WhisperRock IV. Both come with speed controllers, heatsink compound and all the fittings you need. Models are available for AMD/P3, etc CPUs. the way, are Altech Computers. Incidentally, you can find a review of the Antec Sonata at www.overclockers. com.au/article.php?id=161513 – along with a huge range of other information. It’s a really informative site. Remember, I said that cooling and silencing go hand-in-hand – and one of the major problems that overclockers face is in getting rid of the extra heat that the overworked CPU generates. Hence the interest on this site. Apart from the Sonata there are, many other quality cases which are well-made and should be pretty quiet. However, having had a recommendation, we decided to go that route. CPU Fans The second part of the equation is the fan(s) you use. There are fans and there are FANS! First of all, let’s look at the most important fan in a PC, the one trying to cool your CPU. You can buy real elcheapo CPU fans in some stores (and also at flea markets, etc) for as little as $10-$20 (or less!). In a word, don’t! It pays to spend a little more on the fan and get quality. Even the good CPU A fan speed controller suitable for the CPU fan or case fan. This one mounts on a spare expansion card backplane; others are available for internal mounting (ie, set-and-forget). siliconchip.com.au fans (decent bearings, etc) aren’t that expensive – around $45 seems to be about the starting point for a good’un, maybe a bit more for something that’s really out of this world. As well as having an airflow rating (at a particular voltage, usually 12V), good fans will also give you a noise level, in dB. The really good fans have very low ratings – they are rated at 30dB or even less (which is way under background level in most offices). I borrowed a digital sound level meter from Jaycar and measured the noise from the CPU fan in my PC. It was over 70dBA. As one of the fan specialists said, “that’s not a fan, that’s a siren!” A little basic fan theory: cooling relies on heat transfer (ie, getting the heat from the chip to the heatsink) and airflow. Airflow relies on three things – a clear airflow path, fan size and fan speed. We’ll get back to the clear airflow path in a moment. The larger the fan, the higher the airflow. The faster the fan, the higher the airflow. Unfortunately, the faster the fan, generally the more noise. Therefore, it’s better to have a larger fan than a faster fan. Ideally, you need a fan that’s as large as will fit on your CPU in the case you’re using. Often the power supply is cheek-by-jowel with the edge of the mainboard and you can’t fit a really large fan. Fortunately, there are some very good, slightly smaller fans. Here’s one of the lownoise “Spire” CPU fans fitted to an Abit motherboard, along with a fan-equipped graphics card in an Antec Sonata case. Some of these small fans are noisy but there are cures. This computer also has a low-noise power supply. Note the case fan (just seen at left) is plugged into a power supply socket marked “fan only” – this allows the power supply “smarts” to also control the case fan. July 2004  11 Just one of the many low-noise case fans we looked at, one of the “Spire” models (from LowNoisePC). The line socket on the right goes to a standard (Molex) disk drive power plug, while the little white socket on the left connects to a speed controller. Just as important as having a low-noise fan is having a good airflow path. Many PC cases simply do not have enough air holes (or big enough ones!). try to get rid of the heat the best way they can. If the system starts behaving erratically (eg, locking up or shutting down) it’s a fair bet that the CPU is running too hot. In this case, the fan speed must be increased or a better fan fitted. For most users, you can back the fan speed off a bit for a really worthwhile reduction in noise. It is unlikely (though not impossible) that you’ll do any damage by reducing fan speed. Case fans A while ago, we made mention of a clear airflow path. This is most relevant when it comes to case fans. Most cases have provision for a case fan but the majority, especially cheaper cases, don’t allow enough airflow. Some have a circular pattern of holes punched into the case with extra holes around the outside for fan mounting. Some have four slots cut instead to suit quick-mount fans. Some cases have both. LowNoisePC recommend that the punched airflow holes be removed, opened out to the full diameter of the fan. The punched holes severely restrict the amount of air which can pass through (compare the punched holes to the very open airflow of the power supply fan). Also note that case fans can be set to suck or blow, depending on which way around they are mounted (not the polarity – most fans do not work with back-to-front polarity). Which way around is correct? Another excellent question. But airflow is itself only part of the story. The air must be able to extract heat from the CPU heatsink – and the best way it can do this is with large fins on the heatsink to allow more contact with the airflow. Again, size can be a problem in many PC cases. Let’s get back to fan speed. Most PCs run fans in one of two ways – flat out (ie, always connected to 12V), so they’re always as noisy as they can be, or in the case of many modern PCs, the fan speed is varied according to the CPU temperature. It seems like a good idea but if you have a noisy fan, this is where you can get one of the most annoying features – a variably pitched whine. The best approach is to run the thing from 12V via a variable speed control. These are very cheap and can be either a little stick-on box or fitted to a backplane plate which sits in one of the unoccupied slots on the back plane. A wire finger-guard allows almost as much airflow as no guard. They’re available in sizes to suit all fans. (This one is for an 80mm case fan). Here are a couple of low-noise power supplies – at left the Zalman “Quiet Solution” 300W supply, while at right is the Vantec “iON”400W supply. We used the Zalman supply in our PC makeover because it was about 2mm smaller than the Vantec. And in our case, size did matter! 12  Silicon Chip Run it slower! For the vast majority of users and uses, the CPU does NOT need to be cooled at its maximum. Provided the system remains stable, you can slow the fan down (remember, that means less noise). It usually doesn’t really matter that the CPU is running slightly hotter than it would with maximum airflow. How much is slightly hotter? Excellent question. Over-clockers run their CPUs hotter (often much hotter) than normal, then siliconchip.com.au Coolers for graphics cards (left) and Northbridge chips (above). The one above is merely a larger heatsink than normal; the one at left is noteworthy because it uses heatpipe technology to shunt heat into the large heatsink, where it will then dissipate. This time, there is no correct answer. It depends whether you are trying to suck or blow – extract warm air from the case, or force cooler outside air into the case. Power supplies are almost always extractors and for this reason alone, case fans usually need to be blowers, especially if your case doesn’t have really good provision for getting air inside the case (lots of air holes and slots). If the case is really well designed so that air is channelled over the most sensitive components (CPU, GPU, etc) there may be some advantage in making the case fan an extractor. Power supplies We have mentioned the power supply (and its fan) a couple of times. After the CPU fan, the power supply fan is often one of the main noise culprits – and it’s one you cannot do much about (please don’t be tempted to open the supply and fit a quieter fan!). What you can do is fit a quieter power supply. Like cases, power supplies have a huge price range and it’s not all about capacity. If you can buy a whole case with supply for between $45 and $70, imagine the corners that the Zalman, for example, is claimed to operate at <20dB in noiseless mode (up to 40°C), rising to 25dB maximum in its “silent” mode (40-60°C) and <30dB if the power supply temperature sensors hit 60°C. Most standard power supply fans run at more than 30dB-40dB all the time. Because power supplies are sealed boxes, there is no danger to you in replacing them: it’s simply a matter of disconnecting cables, undoing four screws and sliding the old supply out – then sliding the new one in, fastening screws and reconnecting the cables. Fortunately virtually all supplies use a standard cut-out and screw positions, so you shouldn’t have any problem there. One little trap for young players: the power connectors for hard disk drives are moulded so that they can only go in one way. Theoretically. I once destroyed a perfectly good hard disk drive These Antec gasket kits (Altech) are intended to kill noise before it has a chance to resonate on the case. The kit on the left has washers and gaskets for case fan and power supply while the one on the right has fan gaskets only. have been cut to do it. Low noise supplies We’ve shown two very quiet supplies: a Zalman “Quiet Solution” 300W noiseless power supply and a Vantec “iON” 400W supply, both of which are drop-in replacements for the existing supply in your computer. The difference in fan noise between these and a standard supply is quite noticeable and the specs back it up: by rushing to force the connectors in the wrong way. I remember thinking as I did it “gee, these aren’t usually this hard to go in . . .” OK, it was after I’d done an all-nighter in the days when a 40MB hard disk was a big deal. We learn from our mistakes! Note that these supplies are for “ATX” machines – you won’t be able to fit them to an older “AT” or “XT” computer. (Why would you want to?!) And, as we said before, don’t be (Left): another example of heatpipe cooling, this time for a hard disk drive. Many of today’s high speed and high-end drives run particularly hot and several now come with fans or fan mounts. Trouble is, they add to the PC noise. This mount also includes bushes which prevent (or at least minimize) hard disk drive noise and vibration from being transmitted through to the case, where it might cause resonances. The HDD mount at right doesn’t offer any cooling but does minimise noise and vibration transmission, securing the drive in special rubber bands. siliconchip.com.au July 2004  13 Here’s the Thermaltake “Silent Tower” heatpipe-based CPU cooler. The thick solid copper base transfers the heat from the CPU, with the heat pipes carrying it away to the radiator. This system mounts through the motherboard, requiring the normal CPU cooler bracket to be removed. One of the H-shaped brackets fits under the motherboard, with insulator, while the second slots in above the copper base, pulling it hard down on the CPU. The smaller “H” bracket is for AMD CPUs. tempted to open the power supply box itself, though: as the iON manual tells you, “. . . it will cause thunder-stroke danger.” (!!) Even these very quiet supplies don’t cost sheep stations – the Zalman 300W model retails for around $90; the Vantec iON 400W for about $118. That’s significantly more than a replacement standard supply will cost – but you do want quiet, don’t you! a heatsink, not a fan. But some highend machines do have a heatsink/fan assembly on the Northbridge. Again, these are likely to be tiny, noisy fans. Once again, you can buy low-noise fans to replace them and lower the overall noise problem. Hard drives, CD/DVD, etc High speed, high capacity drives – especially SCSI – can be noisy. There are several methods of reducing drive noise. The simplest of course is to fit a lower-noise drive – but this is not all that practical nor economical. The most popular way is to mount the hard drive (or CD, etc) in a noisereducing cradle. These avoid or reduce the metal-to-metal contact which can transmit drive noise to the case. The NoiseMagic NoVibes III (from LowNoisePC) is a very economical mount which holds the drive in place by special rubber bands, with the drive itself sitting on rubber pads. There are other approaches – plastic or nylon pads on which the drives sit, also trying to reduce transmitted noise. Hard drives operate notoriously hot, especially modern high speed drives and even more especially many fast SCSI drives. And heat is one of the things that will eventually kill them. Most PC cases virtually force you to stack drives one on top of the other; for even more heat build up. This is often “cured”– by adding a fan. Uh-oh – more noise! There are some exceptions with very quiet drive fans but usually they are tiny little high revving banshees. A much better approach is to use a “heat pipe” mount such as the Zalman ZM-2HC1 we’ve shown here (it also came from LowNoisePC but of course there are many others). It silently Video cards The majority of computers sold these days have integrated graphics – the video “card” is part of the motherboard. Even those computers which do have a separate video card do not normally have a fan on the card – usually just a heatsink. However, high-end video cards, such as would be used by gamers or those doing a lot of video processing work, usually incorporate a fan. Some are very quiet, others (just like CPU fans) scream their little heads off. You can buy replacement fans for most video cards if this is a problem (some have fans integrated into the card itself). They may only contribute a small proportion of the noise – but any reduction is worthwhile. Northbridge coolers The Northbridge chip (found on modern PCs) is the second largest chip after the CPU. In most cases it will simply have 14  Silicon Chip The Silent Tower fitted to the CPU/motherboard. Kinda dominates it, doesn’t it! We are a little concerned about the mass of the unit hanging off the (vertical) motherboard. And we were disappointed in the amount of fan noise – Thermaltake believe it may have been damaged in transit. siliconchip.com.au shunts the heat away from the drive without the use of fans. This mount, which includes rubber dampers to minimise drive noise even more, takes a standard 3-1/2in drive and fits to a standard 5-1/4in drive bay. As a general rule, if you have the room, always mount your drives with as much space between them as possible. Other things to cool? If you are trying to extract the last xteenth of performance from your PC, it’s likely that you are going to be running everything hot. And of course you have to get rid of that heat before it cooks something. We’ve seen one gamer’s machine with no less that 12 case fans fitted. That’s not overkill, that’s OVERKILL! There is a better way. You can get heatsinks or coolers for just about every part of your PC today – even such things as memory sticks. Any of the suppliers mentioned in this article will be able to help you out here. Ducting Sometimes ducting is fitted between an external case fan and a hot part of the “works” (usually the CPU). Whether this works for you, especially in an after-market setup, is problematical. We tried ducting before we did anything else – and found the CPU noise level actually increased significantly! Heat pipes We mentioned heat pipes a moment ago for hard drives and graphics cards. But you can also get heat pipe coolers for CPUs. One of the more interesting stands we saw at CeBIT was that of Anyware Computer Accessories (www. anyware.com.au, 02 9879 5788). The thing that really caught our attention (along with some great looking cases, silent power supplies, CPU fans, etc) was the new Thermaltake “Silent Tower” Heatpipe Cooling system. Anyware are Thermaltake’s major distributor. The heatpipe clamps to the PC motherboard, sandwiching the CPU. A low-speed (2500 rpm, claimed at 21dBA) 80mm fan pushed air through the heatpipe. It’s not small, reaching out to about 150mm above the surface and is about 110 x 95mm. A pair of large H-shaped siliconchip.com.au If you want it in one handy package, this POLO12 kit from Thermaltake/ Anyware Computers could be it: a low noise 410W power supply, quiet 80mm case fan and CPU fan/heatsink and three fan speed controllers – two mounted on a drive-bay bracket and one on a backplane bracket. It sells for $149. brackets (and insulating gasket) holding it firmly in place. The standard mounting holes, normally used for traditional CPU coolers, are used. As the vast majority (if not all) motherboards come with a bracket already situated in these mounting holes, this must be removed prior to mounting the tower. Fitting was quite easy but the instructions do suffer a common oriental failing: tiny, tiny type (bordering on unreadable). While it works, our major reservation with the heat pipe is the rather massive structure it places on the motherboard. Remember that in a tower case, the motherboard is mounted vertically, meaning the heatpipe assembly is “hanging out in space”, horizontal to the motherboard. While the weight is not overly high, we’re worried about what this heatpipe might do in time. Could the stresses deform the board? We don’t know – we’re only raising the possibility. The other disturbing aspect to the Thermaltake heatpipe is its fan noise. As we said, Thermaltake claim 21dB (with respect to what?) but we measured this fan at 55dBA. That’s significantly higher than any of the other approaches we’ve tried in this article and not too far off the 66dBA we were suffering from originally. Admittedly, the Thermaltake heatpipe fan is largely airflow noise, not the highly annoying whine we had. And of course, you can fit a speed controller and reduce that noise somewhat. Thermaltake were staggered at our reading and believed that the fan may have been damaged in transit. Despite our reservations, it does look very impressive! Recommended retail price of the Silent Tower is $59.00. Thermaltake Cooling Kit There was another product from Thermaltake/Anyware which caught our attention: a purpose-designed cooling “kit” designed to do exactly what we are talking about in this article. The Polo12 comes in a little carry box, as photographed, and consists of a 410W “Silent Purepower” power supply, claimed to operate with only 17dBA during normal operation; a 120mm adjustable-speed case fan (operating from 1300 to 3000 RPM); an 80 x 80 x 25mm CPU cooler, also with 1300-3000 RPM adjustable speed and a large heatsink with copper base; two manual speed controllers – one is a 2-channel unit designed for the front panel (in a spare 5-1/4in drive bay) while the other is a single-channel unit for the rear panel (in an unused expansion slot position). July 2004  15 The CPU cooler, by the way, comes with all the hardware you will need for a Pentium 4, AMD K7 or K8 chip. And the 410W supply is tricked-up with pretty blue LEDs – though these would be somewhat wasted inside any case without a see-through side panel. But we can confirm it is beautifully quiet! The Thermaltake POLO12 kit is available through Anyware Computer Accessories resellers for $149. Water cooling Yeah, we know, water cooling, it’s off with the pixies, right? Something that real geeks might do but not for you? You shouldn’t mix water and electricity, right? What happens if it springs a leak? Mmm . . . not exactly: water cooling is becoming more common these days. A lot of it might be to do with how it looks but there is more to water cooling than appearance. Water cooling IS a viable proposition if (a) your machine operates very hot – perhaps by over-clocking, (b) you don’t mind having pipes all around your computer, and (c) you don’t mind spending money! They work just like water cooling in a car engine – a pump forces coolant through the system, which transfers heat into the coolant via heatsinks; then a fan pushes air through a radiator to cool the coolant again. We showed one watercooled PC in last month’s CeBIT report – a 2.4GHz Intel over-clocked to 3.5GHz. Normally this would be a pretty unstable beast but they assured us it was perfectly happy operating at this speed. Apart from the cost and hardware, one of the biggest problems with water cooling has been noise – both from the water pump and from the fan. These problems have largely been overcome in recent times, with virtually silent pumps and fans now available. Typical of the modern genre of water cooling is the Zalman “Reserator” – a contraction of reservoir and radiator – along with its matching CPU water block. This rather imposing looking device (the radiator section stands some 600m high!) has an integral pump which circulates water into the computer, extracting heat from the CPU (and graphics card if the optional block is fitted) and thence back to the radiator. Does it work? The manufacturers 16  Silicon Chip Whether it’s legitimately to get rid of a lot of heat or simply for the “wow” factor, the big Zalman “Reserator” Fanless Water Cooling System sure looks impressive. Shown here is the basic system; you can also cool the graphics card and other heat-sensitive components with add-ons. Inset is the CPU water block. We haven’t shown any of the valves on the pipes which control the coolant flow levels. say so – and the photo we showed last month ably demonstrates it. But we weren’t quite at the thrillseeker stage enough to fully install the Reserator on one of our systems – just enough to take a few photos. However, even this much convinced us that it wouldn’t be too difficult to do it “for real”. One of the drawbacks of water cooling is that you don’t know something is wrong (eg, a blockage or pump failure) until it’s too late. For this reason, Zalman include a flow indicator which tells you that there is circulation occuring. The Zalman Reserator kit sells for around $350.00 from Altec Computer resellers. Contacts: Of the three organisations mentioned in this article two are distributors, selling through a chain of dealers throughout the country. LowNoisePC sells direct to the public, mainly via their website (www.lownoisepc.com.au). Contact is Rodney Maslovsky, (02) 9403 3305. Altech Computers (02 9735 5655 (www.altech.com.au) and Anyware Computers (02 9879 5788 (www.anyware.com.au) will be able to direct you to their resellers. siliconchip.com.au The ultimate silent PC? Proudly on display at Altech was their very-new Zalman TNN500A “Totally NoNoise” case. It was so new it wasn’t even in the country for CeBIT, only three weeks before. (The best laid plans, etc, etc). “Totally NoNoise” is not an idle claim – this computer case has all but eliminated noise so it’s ideal for use in extremely quiet environments. Into the bargain, it also offers zero dust and zero electromagnetic interference. Primarily, Zalman have eliminated noise by eliminating fans. The special low-noise power supply is fanless; the CPU is cooled by heat pipes which duct heat away to the case. The high-end graphics card and the hard disk drive mounts also use heat pipes instead of a fan. And the very heavy duty case (5mm aluminium) itself forms a large heatsink While hard disk drives will normally generate some noise (after all, they are mechanical), the drives are locked away behind sound-quieting doors and special disk mounting arrangements mean any vibration or other noise is not transmitted through to the case. And some brands/types of hard disk drives are much quieter than others to start with (Zalman recommend hydraulic bearing hard drives). With 1GB flash disks already on the market and 2GB becoming available, some users may be able to get away with no mechanical disk drives. In the demonstration model at Altech (photographed here), it was fully set up and tricked up with those fancy neon and LED lights. Believe it or not, the ONLY noise you could hear was a tiny buzz from one of the neon tubes. “Have to replace that tube,” they said! Just like in the Mafia, silence does, of course, have a cost. The case alone will set you back around $1300. By the time you’ve selected all the other low-noise components for this computer (and you’d want a high performance motherboard/CPU/graphics card/etc) you’d be up for the best part of three to four grand. Is it worth it? For the average user, probably not – unless silence is golden, eg, in a home theatre system. Altech tell us that the Zalman NoNoise case has attracted a lot of attention from TV and Sound Studios, where any noise from a computer can be an absolute disaster. (We recently toured one of Australia’s leading sound studios and they had gone to the trouble of housing their computers in a soundproof room next door via long cables. With this case, they wouldn’t need to.) It’s big (670h x 400d x 286w [mm], including castor wheels) and it’s heavy (case alone is 25kg plus motherboard, cards, disk drives, etc). The Zalman Totally NoNoise case is available exclusively through Altech Computers resellers. It certainly makes a statement – but it does it oh, so silently. siliconchip.com.au July 2004  17 Silencing my noisy PC – step-by-step. (1) Disconnect everything external. Mains power lead (first, of course) and everything else which plugs into the back (or front) of your computer: monitor power (not always), monitor signal, printer, speakers, network connections, USB devices, and so on.     Then open up your case – various cases work in various ways. Some are screwless, others have screws to release one side panel; others have six screws which allows the whole top of the case to be removed. (2) Disconnect everything internal: power supply (1 large Molex plug/socket on an ATX), HDD/ CD-ROM and FDD ribbon cables, power leads to all the disk drives, audio cable to the CD-ROM and all the cables which connect to the front panel switches and LEDs. A tip here: draw yourself a mud map of which connectors go where. Most motherboards are labelled these days, as are the connectors – but it’s a lot easier if you have drawn a diagram and labelled it with which PC board headers go to which connectors. 18  Silicon Chip (3) Remove the motherboard. If you’re a thrill-seeker, you can skip this step. But I really don’t like the idea of swarf shorting out motherboard components . . . and besides, it’s a lot easier to work on the motherboard outside the case.    There are normally six screws holding an “ATX” motherboard in place (sometimes eight). That doesn’t include the backplane screws which hold expansion cards in place, which you’ll also need to remove. (4) If you’re fitting a case fan AND the airflow path is made up of a lot of tiny holes, cut around the outside of the outer circle of holes (we used a drill first, then a nibbler) and smooth the edges with a file. Be sure to give the case a good cleanout to remove any swarf. (5) Fit the case fan inside the case with a wire finger-guard on the outside of the case. Note how much clearer the airflow path is now – almost the same as the power supply. Four screws normally hold both fan and guard in place. Low-noise fans normally don’t need anything extra but standard fans should be used with a noise-reducing gasket. (6) Speaking of the power supply, now’s the time to fit the new lownoise one. Before you do, though, check that it is the same size as the one coming out. We found one was about 2mm deeper than the existing one and simply wouldn’t fit in the case once the new fan/heatsink was fitted (needless to say, discovered after the event . . .).     Four screws hold the power supply on the rear of the PC. If you are going to fit a gasket, it should be done now. If you think it would be a good idea about now to test the power supply and case fan for noise, we’ve got some bad news: ATX supplies need to be connected to the motherboard so that you can “start” them with the power switch. So you’re going to have to be patient! Put the case to one side while we attack the motherboard . . . siliconchip.com.au Here’s how I attacked my perfectly good – but very noisy – PC. Naturally, not all cases, motherboards, fans and heatsinks will be the same. But they tend to follow the same basic principles, so use these photos and descriptions to silence your own particular PC. And am I happy with the results? You better believe it. It’s so quiet I could easily doze off. . . (9) Follow the instructions with your fan/heatsink assembly to mount it to the bracket, in intimate contact with the CPU. Our Zalman CNP7000A, for instance, simply had two aluminium pieces (called “retention guides”) which fitted through the bracket and two screws secured the fan/heatsink. (7) Have a good look at the CPU heatsink/fan assembly to determine how it comes off. Most have some form of spring clips which need to be pushed down and out to release them.    In most circumstances, you don’t need to remove the heatsink retaining bracket (the orange thing in our photos) which is fixed to the motherboard. The exception would be things like the Thermaltake heat pipe which fixes through the board. (10) Ensure that the CPU and heatsink are in intimate contact and that the heatsink is level (ie, not mounted at an angle). Some heatsinks will do this automatically as they are fastened in place but others – such as the Silent Tower heatpipe – are fastened down by four nuts which keep their brackets under pressure. These must be tightened evenly. (8) Clean the old heatsink gunk from the top of the CPU chip with a piece of tissue paper. It’s probably hardened a bit by now and invariably, new CPU fan/heatsink assemblies come with new heatsink compound. Put some new heatsink compound on the top of the CPU.     (11) If you’re fitting one of the backplane fan speed controls, remove one of the back-plane covers and screw the speed control in its place. Alternatively, internal speed controllers can now be fitted. Connect the fan power socket to the controller and the controller power socket to the CPU fan outlet on the motherboard. siliconchip.com.au (12) Now reconnect everything you disconnected before. Aren’t you glad you made a mud map? Check twice to make sure all the drives, the front panel switches/ LEDs, CD sound, etc are all connected as they should be. If you are mounting a heatsink which needs to pass through the board (such as the Thermaltake Silent Tower), you need to remove the heatsink mounting bracket from the motherboard. In this case, prise up the four pegs on the top side of the board and remove them, then carefully push the bracket pins through from the underside. Don’t slip – motherboard tracks are very fine and easily damaged! The above photo shows the cooling fan and its mounting bracket, as removed from the motherboard. Now you’re ready for the “smoke test” – and hopefully everything will be OK. Set the fan speeds to the noise level required and monitor CPU temperatures. July 2004  19 Starting from scratch – building a low-noise PC If you want a new low-noise PC, the approach isn’t too different . . . except that you aren’t starting behind the 8-ball with a noisy case. All the products and techniques about quieting a PC earlier in this article are also applicable to building a quiet PC from scratch. The important thing, as we discussed, is to start with a quality case. We mentioned before the Antec Sonata low-noise case from Altech. While there are many other cases around, some of which probably offer low noise, this case impressed us because it’s designed and made to be low noise. Let’s see why: Overall construction: the first impression you get is that the Sonata is heavy and solid. First impressions are correct. It is beautifully made – I’m not real sure yet about the “piano black” finish (dust and fingerprints really show up on high gloss) but time will tell. I mentioned previously that my elcheapo case was held together with 12 rivets. I lost count at about 20 on the Sonata, and that was because I didn’t want to completely disassemble the thing. 120mm case fan: not only is it big and can therefore rev slower, the cutout is not a series of tiny punched holes. The airflow is very good – almost as good as the power supply fan. Just as important (perhaps even more so), the fan is mounted to the case on bushes so there is no (or minimal) noise transfer to the case. The case has provision for mounting a second 120mm fan alongside the drive bays – and the plastic mounting bushes are included in the bag of hardware. Low-noise power supply: the PSU fitted to the Sonata is the Antec Trupower 380W. It’s not the top-of-theline low-noise supply but it’s not far from it. We’ve already mentioned the power supply fan airflow; the power supply really is whisper quiet. Incidentally, the power supply has special “fan only” power sockets which allow the case fan to come under the power supply’s noise reduction system. One really neat point about the Trupower: it has a four-pin (12V, 5V) “Molex” power socket (hard disk type) on the back of the supply, next to the power switch. Great if you want to power something externally (like an external drive, etc). Special HDD mounting: just about every computer we’ve seen has the drive bays accessible from the front of the case, with the drives mounting fore and aft. Not so the Sonata: the HDD drive bays can only be accessed from inside the case, with the drives mounting side-to-side in drive caddies (we haven’t seen that used since 8086 machines!) located low down behind the front panel. And all of the drives mount on the caddies on rubber grommets with special screws so once again there is no metal-to-metal contact; minimal vibration/noise transfer so no resonances. Easy access: two large thumb-screws fasten the side panel to the rear panel. Once these are removed, the side panel can be unlocked (yes, with a key) and the latch sprung to allow the side panel to swing open. Once fully opened, it can be removed if you wish to work on the machine. Similarly, all externally-accessed drives (CD/DVD/floppy) are accessed by unlocking and opening a door on the front panel. This might seem like overkill but the front panel door effectively masks the noise of what are often noisy devices. By the way, all externally-accessed drives mount in the conventional way in bays. What’s the damage? You can expect to pay around $200 for the Antech Sonata. Yes, it’s a lot more than the “standard” cases most PCs come in. But it’s a lot more case – worth every cent of it! SC Another look at some of the special features of the quiet Antec Sonata case: left is the front with the externally-accessible drive bay door open (and one face plate removed!) Closing this door cuts down on significant amount of noise (from CDROM drives, for example). As mentioned in the text, all “internal” hard disk drives mount on special carriers to minimise noise and vibration transfer – one such carrier is shown above right, complete with hard disk drive fitted on bushes. 20  Silicon Chip siliconchip.com.au